


The Living Diary of a Broken Soul

by EsseR3xinaLives



Category: Original Work
Genre: Drabble, Freeform, Mental Health Issues, Mentions of COVID-19, Mentions of Corona Virus, Prisoner's Dilemma, mentions of eating disorders, mentions of internalized homophobia, mentions of suicidal ideation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2020-07-28 09:00:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20061415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EsseR3xinaLives/pseuds/EsseR3xinaLives
Summary: It's not that bad having a broken soul, that just means there's more of me to share.  So whoever else is broken can take the pieces of me I scatter here, because although we may never be whole again we can find a way to become a little bit more complete.





	1. The Perks of Having a Broken Soul

I suppose I ought to start this work at the beginning.

Why would I describe myself as broken and why would would I post a journal about it?

I suppose those are valid questions and I hope this chapter will provide a sufficient answer to those inquiries and, if not, I can try to explicate further later on.

In any case, I suppose I should start from when I decided I had to have been broken, which I would definitely pinpoint as being in middle school. When I was in sixth grade I moved in with my dad. That had been a recurring theme throughout my life with my parents being divorced and the constant custody struggles that ensued between them. I didn't think much of it since I had lived with him before during fourth grade, and I'm not even sure if I thought too much on it later. It was simply the way things were. Even the times where I didn't have a bedroom because there were only two room, but it'd be improper for me to share a room with either my dad or my brothers so I slept on the living room floor.

I always noticed a distinct difference in treatment between my brothers and me, but I tried not to let that bother me.

I instead decided to focus my efforts on school and church, hoping that if I dedicated myself to outside pursuits I could hide the emptiness I felt at being so disconnected from my family. That I might even find a community that could replace the love I felt like I was missing from them.

Of course, the more I tried to fit in the more I realized how broken I was.

I was absolutely depressed, finding no interest in anything, constantly running away from home, staying in bed either oversleeping or just remaining there wide awake as I refused to leave because the world outside of my bed was too cruel, finding a love that could never happen.

That last one was the one that hurt the most, but what made it hurt wasn't the inevitable rejection I knew I'd face if I confessed, oh no.

What made it hurt was that I intrinsically knew it was wrong.

_It was so wrong_ I'd always try to remind myself as I'd eagerly await to see her arrive at the church. As I'd push away the dreams I'd have of marrying her brother, only to tell her later how overjoyed I was that now we'd officially be family. As I'd watch her flirt with the boys, trying to hide my jealousy because she'd always pinpoint the people who had a crush on her and I was so scared she'd see it in me.

I was so convinced it was wrong.

I always had the thought _if only I were a boy. If I were a boy I'd be the best boyfriend she could ever ask for._

I'm not sure why I believed that so wholeheartedly when i could barely be a good friend to her. I was certain my embodiment was to blame for that too.

And I couldn't hide my brokenness forever.

I broke down one day after a church meeting and she pulled me into an empty room. I cried my heart out to her, explaining that if only I were a boy, _if only I were a boy,_ because I was never meant to be a girl. I wasn't interested in make-up or fashion or... honestly I didn't even know what else girls were supposed to be interested in, I just knew they weren't supposed to be in love with other women.

I didn't admit that to her until years later, but this conversation stilled my heart when I was struggling with the anxiety of finally coming out to her.

It also helped that as we kept in touch she'd always ask me if I had a 'sweetheart' instead of a 'boyfriend.'

She told me that I was okay, that there was nothing wrong with me being who I was and that I'd realize the blessings that came with being me.

I couldn't remember it word for word, I was too distressed to catch on to more than that, but that made me feel okay.

Like no matter how broken or wrong I was, that didn't necessitate that I wasn't okay.

And that made everything a little better, because no matter how wrong I had thought it was to enjoy looking forward to seeing her on Sunday, to get flustered at her compliments on my dress as I'd try to convince her that I was nothing compared to her, as we stayed after to sing together in the church choir, it was all okay. Because she gave me the courage to believe it was okay.

Eventually however, I had to leave. My mom had decided she wanted custody back so I moved back in across the country with her, but that was okay. I was happier with my mom, and I made sure to contact maintain contact with her, because all i wanted was her in my life always.

After fourteen months my dad sued for custody, determining who would get to keep us once and for all.

He won.

I cried the entire three hour flight out there as I tried to console myself. _She_ would be there. I would see her on Sunday, I wouldn't be alone.

She wasn't there.

I got on my e-mail to ask why she wasn't there, but she had moved while I was away.

As short as fourteen months felt under my mom's custody, it felt like too long if it meant _she_ could move away in that time.

My heart felt like it was always breaking.

The depression and rage returned, never having fully left me, but adding to the heartbreak of leaving behind the life I had so desperately loved under my mom.

Perhaps fourteen months was a long time. I had created a life for myself where I thought I could be happy.

That all felt lost now, sucked into a void as my older brother was denied the ability to attend high school since his home school credits didn't transfer and my attendance at a performing arts school was all but ripped away from me. I just wanted to sing, and maybe be as good as _she_ was someday.

I wanted my dream back.

I e-mailed my guardian adleidem, telling her of how unsafe I felt living with my dad and how scared I was of my own behaviors slipping from the sheer distress I felt at being there. That the schools weren't helping us and I was mad at them for not taking in my brother after my dad won custody over us for educational neglect when I was obtaining straight A's in the school I'd attended prior.

I said I was scared my rage would get so out of hand I'd bomb the school.

My dad picked me up from my bus stop to take me to the hospital, where they diagnosed me with anorexia.

I could easily explain that the reason I lost twenty pounds in one month was because Dad wouldn't provide food for us, but he was quick to denounce with the counselor I met with that I ate plenty of junk food, it was just me being a picky eater that I wasn't eating.

Who would take the word of a mentally distressed fifteen-year-old over that of a charismatic father who would pay for that child's entire inpatient hospital treatment.

I tried to call my mom, explaining what was going on, but my dad hit the hook switch. The dial tone rang as I screamed at him. He had no right to deny me the chance to talk with my mother. He answered back to explain that she was just agitating me more, but I was sick of his excuses. I was ready to leave.

Only to find out I couldn't.

The doors were locked as I tried to bang against them, screaming that they couldn't just keep me here. That they couldn't just let my dad lock me away somewhere where I couldn't talk to my mom. They couldn't just do that.

Counselors came and talked me down. I would be spending the night there which didn't sound so bad. My dad couldn't stay there.

The next day someone was discharged and I got lost in the crowd where I could've simply left the hospital. I decided to go back. I wasn't totally sold on being there, but it was better than being at Dad's, and there was some comfort in knowing that I could leave if I took the opportunity to. I wasn't totally trapped.

Of course, being hospitalized with anorexia was overwhelming. I felt like the first meal I'd eaten was the biggest meal I'd eaten in my life, and I was supposed to have three of them. People in outpatient discussed how they have to take those food trackers home to make sure they were maintaining their healthy eating habits after being discharged and that had me worried. I knew my dad was never going to follow through with any plan they gave and I wondered how he'd sweet talk his way out of it.

The next day it was decided that I wasn't actually anorexic.

It wasn't until I spied a letter from the hospital to my dad that they decided to diagnose me with depression instead.

I loved being there. I was finally in a space where others were open about being broken. About being hurt or experiencing depression, they all had their pieces scattered into existence just as I felt mine were, but that was okay. Because with each other we could pick up those pieces, and with those pieces we created a community, of broken people sharing the pieces of themselves with each other because it was too scary to be broken alone, and why try to recreate a person imitating a whole, when you could create something entirely different?

Never had I felt like I belonged to a community before.

Never did I want to believe that the community couldn't last.

Of course it couldn't, confidentiality rules dictated that we couldn't interact with each other once we left the hospital. It felt like someone took a hammer to our sculpture of shattered pieces and demanded we take only what belonged to us and leave. I took some of the other's pieces with me. I never wanted to forget the feeling of being complete. I probably left behind some of the pieces of myself so that they could have the comfort to, should they need it. Others might have just gotten left behind and lost, but it's okay. They might just be picked up in a way I didn't realize they could be.

I transitioned into outpatient, but it wasn't the same. I wasn't living with people who understood my struggles and gave me positive comments at every turn. In outpatient I felt like I was supposed to be less broken.

I began to realize why I never felt like I could fit into society. Being broken was a taboo that you either fixed or hid.

I never bothered with either.

I called my mom every night after I was discharged, after meeting so many people who were hospitalized for suicide attempt I wanted to make sure there was at least one person who I could talk to. Who I knew would notice if I did anything or if anything happened.

Knowing she was still fighting for me was the only thing I felt like I had going for me.

Eventually, she told me that we couldn't talk anymore. All conversations between us were supposed to be supervised by a mediator and we never complied, I felt like it was too invasive, and I never trusted any of them after I felt like my pleas to return home were ignored.

They didn't have to take my mom away.

I had made a friend during that time in my junior year. She immediately knew something was off and rushed me out of the class as I cried outside, explaining what the courts said as she promised me that we could find loop holes. We could set things up so that I could still talk to my mom again. As she told me this another choir mate left the room, getting some water from the drinking fountain before admitting that she didn't know what was going on, but she could tell I needed a hug. I accepted the hug as much as I accepted the pieces of themselves these two offered so willingly to me, helping me feel a little more complete when trying to fit the pieces I had lost would only feel hollow.

I relied on them to provide pieces for me until I left my dad's to live with my grandparents my senior year.

It was hard returning to the school I'd started at. I didn't have any of the training that others who had been there for years had as i also struggled to maintain my broken soul. I had found friends during the year, but many left, moving on to other escapades. I eventually moved back in with my mom once I aged out of the custodial restrictions since at eighteen I was deemed my own guardian, but I still struggled to be complete. My mother was working extreme hours as I wanted her to try to fix me.

It wasn't until much later I realized how selfish I was for not realizing my mom needed to borrow pieces of me that I'd withhold. My young adult mind assumed she'd always be whole but I still demanded pieces of her so that I could feel more complete.

When i realized that I also realized how difficult a mothers job had to have been, because where do mother's get their pieces when they're shattered? As a child I could say I was too selfish to share mine, and i realized later on that my mother didn't have a lot of support.

I've apologized multiple times to her for my negligence and share my pieces with her freely.

But I wouldn't have gotten to that point if it weren't for my college experience. My freshman year was largely a blur, me trying to piece myself together when my sophomore year I finally came out as a lesbian, fashioning a piece for myself in my soul that completed a hollow spot in my existence for too long.

And that's when I met _her._

If i were to say I'd fallen in love before, I'd say it was with the girl I'd sing with in choir at church who assured me that their was nothing wrong with me, even when our religions beliefs would've told us otherwise.

If I were to say I'd fallen in love a second time, it would've been with _her_.

Even if it never got passed longing glances and comforting hugs, I would say that I definitely loved her.

And if there were a higher power or someone granted me one wish, all I could wish for is her happiness.

Anything else would feel too selfish because I'd never forgive myself if I wished for her back in my life. I could never deny her the chance to be happy, even if it has to be without me.

That's not to say it didn't hurt when she left.

I felt like I had been completely shattered all over again, but that was to be expected. I started taking pieces of her to build as the foundation of my soul while giving her every piece of me I had left.

I had no foundation when she took those pieces back.

It was slow, but I was able to take pieces from friends, reconstructing myself as I further studied my college courses to further determine what pieces I wanted to create for myself. It wasn't until I took my first gender studies class that I really felt myself piece myself together in the way I actually wanted, questioning my gender identity and which of society's beliefs I would craft pieces for to fit into my soul and which I'd refine into a completely different belief that would be better suited to me.

It wasn't until after that I began to feel complete.

And even now, I find ways to feel even more complete.

Because one of the pieces of me that I worked into my soul is the disbelief in absolutes. I don't believe I'll ever be complete, because my soul is the process of me continually reconstructing myself in order to be the best person I can be, for myself as well as for those around me. If I were complete there would be no space in me to accept other peoples' pieces whenever they'd give them to me, nor would I have any pieces to give the people who would need them. The reformation of a broken soul is constant and ever-changing, but it's never about the final product, because if I were to announce I were complete prematurely I'd deny myself the chance to continue to engage in this exchange.

It makes me believe there was a reason that piece and peace as phonetically the same, because peace cannot be achieved unless we are willing to share parts of ourselves to promote others.

Which brings me to the reason I am writing this diary. Because when I think of people being broken, I don't see them as people needing to be fixed. Instead I recognize them as people who have been hurt, who have gotten scars, who recognize the suffering the world can cause as it chips away at their heart. Being broken is not the same as being dysfunctional, but is instead standing up after the moment of being shattered and being able to admit that, despite all the unfairness, you will turn the heartbreak into something beautiful. Just like how some scars never heal, one cannot go back to being unbroken, but they can find pieces that others share so that even if the scar is there it's not a memory of pain, but a moment of resilience.

So I will post my pieces here.

So that anyone who needs them can take the pieces they need to help create a more complete form of themselves as I hope to gain more pieces of myself.

So that maybe, eventually, we can all match our pieces together to create a community that fits all of our souls so that we can always find ourselves in a place of love and acceptance.


	2. I am From

I started grad school last week. For as much as I love school I deeply underestimated just how nervous I would be to return to it. I don't know why I'm always so nervous, I know everything's going to be okay, but my mind doesn't believe it until its seen it. In any case I had a class that started with this ice breaker that I'd never seen before and I liked it enough that I wanted to post it. Perhaps this will give a greater into who I am.

I am From

I am from a suitcase that I never bothered to unpack because the knowledge I'd need to use it again soon was always too prominent.

I am from both sides of the gender spectrum as well as many spaces in between and the spaces it doesn't reach.

I am from a poverty I didn't realize and a wealth I never experienced.

I am from a culture I find violent and dominating that is largely to my shame.

I am from a body that embraces vulnerability to those of my same.

I am from a frantic mind that is lovingly my own.

I am from a church I embraced more than it ever did me.

I am from a pessimistic viewpoint that white ovals create change.

I am from a broken home that, though incomplete, has found a way to become whole.

I am from a learning that broke down my perceptions and allowed me to find who I am.

I am from a lazy body that believes any place can be a place worthwhile as long as I create it that way.

I am from inspirational friends who taught me that everyone, including myself, has value.

I am from quiet creeks and whispering trees that I can run to to embrace me when loneliness kicks in.

I am from a robbed childhood that understand that a custody battle is a kind of war.

I am from a community that doesn't always recognize me, but I still stand by with a burning passion.

I am from a love of fantasy that fuels my optimism that anything is possible.

I am from a childish mindset where cartoons and comics inspire me to believe that solutions are possible.

I am from a belief in better, that better is out there and that better is possible to achieve.


	3. The Ultimate Goal of All Living Souls

It was my first day of class today. Well... it was my first day of _this_ class. This week is actually week three of graduate school, but for some reason Saturday classes had to be fashionably late.

I suppose it should go without saying that entering a new classroom is incredibly anxiety inducing. Even if the class only has six students with five of them sharing the classes with me that started three weeks ago it was still nerve-wracking.

Introductions are nerve-wracking.

It just never gets easier, especially since I recently decided to use a preferred name. No, I don't identify as female. No, I do not like it when you shorten my name. I clearly said what my preferred name was and, even if it _is_ two names stuck together and is signified with two capitals it's only three syllables. It's interesting that although my legal name had more syllables people were less determined to shorten it than my preferred name, but it's a boy's name and a girl's name in a single name. When you shorten it to one it is an act of limiting my gendered experience as opposed to being willing to recognize the whole.

And I love it so much.

I came up with this name when I was ten years old coming up with a name for my _Animal Crossing_ avatar. I was just going to use my legal name when my older brother made a rule that our avatar's name couldn't be the same as our "real" names. I thought it over, thinking of what my goals were, who I wanted to be, what I wanted to convey.

I wanted to create a name that was the ultimate representation of me.

And I did.

And I became obsessed with that name, creating a signature for when I finally got to change it, using it in the third person when I was alone and imagining a world where everyone just referred to me as that.

Because that was my name.

And my name was representative of my mission that I feel like applies to all living souls.

I was creating myself. I will admit, I find myself to be a terrible artist, but that didn't matter here. I have this life, I have this body, I have these thoughts and feelings and experiences that cannot be replicated by any other person on the planet!

The soul is a piece of art. And since this is the only soul that I will ever have the opportunity to craft it is my duty to forge this into the ultimate person that I can imagine.

This is the purpose of all living souls.

Every person that exists has the opportunity to determine the kind of person they wish to be and forge themselves into it. And every person is able to do it in their own time, because there is no rush to becoming a finished product. If you feel like you've completed crafting yourself you have officially abandoned the pursuit of creating yourself. So take the time to decide who you want to be. Who you _really_ want to be. The reason I emphasize this is because society has pre-made molds for how they _think_ we should create ourselves, but souls have no place in censorship. For when a society tells a populace that their souls must conform to the strokes and systems in the society it robs the right of people to their own selves. And the theft of a self is a murder in its own right.

So we must take the freedom to craft ourselves to the ultimate selves we desire to be. To share our colors with the people around us that they may find inspiration to further craft themselves, without utilizing our brushes to paint over the colors they have crafted for themselves. To remind every soul, no matter what process they are in within crafting their soul that their soul is beautiful. That the colors they choose to use are wonderful and that they have unlimited options on how to craft themselves. We all are striving to be the best versions of ourselves, and posting this is one way that I'm trying to achieve that.

I've never been much of a fan of destiny. I decided I would never be fated to be a hero like in the shows I grew up watching and dreaming that I could be a part of, so instead I do this. Because if there's one thing I know I'm destined to do is that I'm destined to die. Life is about the process, not the end.

So craft the ultimate self you think about. Whenever you think about wishing to do something, think of the process that will allow you to craft that wish into a reality. Start on the things you were on the fence of doing and take your time doing things. If something feels off in the portrait of your soul then don't be afraid to acknowledge that. Always be humble enough to admit if something you tried wasn't quite in line with your desired self. That will give you more space to add the colors that will work better within your soul.

The possibilities are endless for how you can craft your soul.

So craft your soul fearlessly.

And I hope this will help you live your life more freely.


	4. Pieces of Community (And the Greatest Prisoner's Dilemma Ever)

It seemed inevitable that I would have to address COVID-19 at some point, but I was really hoping it wasn't like this.

And by "like this" I'm not referring to the quarantine.

Sure, the quarantine has been hard and it's definitely affected some people more than others. I'm lucky and privileged enough to have a job that can still keep me employed during this time. That I'm financially stable enough to be able to ride this out. That I can do all of this from my house.

There are many others who are not so fortunate.

I know this pandemic has displaced so many people, leaving them suddenly unemployed with very little options of securing a new source of income. That people are making sacrifices in juggling whether they must risk the safety of their loved ones by continuing to work or if they have the capacity to try to wait this pandemic out. But for how long?

I know I don't have the answer, and things have only gone from bad to worse.

After my state was told to go into quarantine earthquakes started hitting my area. This is another point where I am lucky and privileged because the earthquake had knocked out power to many buildings and caused severe damage to others. My house is still standing.

But that's not even the worst part of it all. The pandemic and earthquakes are all unsettling, but we were taking measures to keep everyone safe and well during these times.

At least, that's what I had hoped.

I used to joke that the only thing that could make this worse was the zombie apocalypse. Of course, there was something more realistic that ended up being worse.

In my state people rallied to protest the social distancing ordinances and demand the government reopen businesses.

And the government caved.

Sure, businesses are open now and people can go about as long as they wear masks, sanitize and whatever else to stay healthy, but COVID-19 cases in my state were continuing to rise even during the full quarantine. To call this re-opening premature would assume that full quarantine had even begun to take effect. COVID-19 didn't slow down at all in my state.

And this is just going to make things worse.

All because of the prisoner's dilemma.

Just as a little bit of backup, the prisoner's dilemma is a hypothetical scenario where two individuals are charged of a crime that there's no evidence to convict them on. The police need a confession so they take the two individuals into two separate rooms and tell each individual these outcomes:

If they both remain silent they will each be sentenced to prison for 1 year.

If one accuses the other of the crime and the other stays silent that person will be sentenced to 3 years of prison while the accuser goes free.

If they both accuse each other they will each be sentenced to 2 years of prison.

What these options show is whether an individual would be willing to cooperate with another and trust that they would also cooperate for the communal good. After all, if they both remain silent then they both serve a 1 year sentence which would be 2 years of prison-time for the both of them. That's less than the total of time served in any of the other options. The flip side to cooperation is defection. People may be distrustful and think that the other would accuse them for the crime so that they can go free and so they will defect from the group to advocate for their own freedom. If they accuse this person because of their distrust but the other person remains silent then that person is left with the burden of serving the time while the other is completely free from it. If they both accuse each other then they both as a group serve 4 years, which is the longest group total of the three options.

And COVID-19 is the greatest example of this.

In the third week of March the schools shut down in my state and, later, businesses were told that they could not host more than 10 people in their buildings. Restaurants could still do pick up and online services, but that was the extent to which they could run. For almost a month people were willing to cooperate.

But then the protest happened.

At this point, people no longer remained silent. They demanded that businesses reopen and that social distancing protocols be removed.

They defected.

They didn't want to stay silent anymore. They should be allowed to walk free while those who stay silent can serve the time for them.

What they're missing is that this adds another year to the time served.

So that they can have their businesses the pandemic will grow, lengthening the amount of time that schools and public services have to close because these people refused to stay silent.

They refused to cooperate.

The interesting thing about the prisoner's dilemma is that it is considered a game theory. All games have winners and losers and while these protesters may believe they are the winners but this dilemma wasn't made for the individuals to win.

It was made for COVID to win.

We had the opportunity to wait it out, but we were too impatient, too greedy, too entitled to our ways of life that the lives and welfare of others failed to matter to us.

We let COVID win.

All that's left is to see if the pieces of community can possibly be salvaged after this is all over.


End file.
